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Solaren’s 日本語 log

  Tags: Japanese
 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log Post Reply
32 messages over 4 pages: 13 4  Next >>
solaren
Newbie
United States
Joined 3525 days ago

36 posts - 42 votes
Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish, Japanese

 
 Message 9 of 32
23 March 2015 at 10:51pm | IP Logged 
I've got the windows version, so unfortunately I'm not much help when it comes to Linux.
However, there are some regulars on the forum over there that are very helpful. You could
probably get a reply within a day :)
1 person has voted this message useful



Warp3
Senior Member
United States
forum_posts.asp?TID=
Joined 5523 days ago

1419 posts - 1766 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish, Korean, Japanese

 
 Message 10 of 32
24 March 2015 at 1:38am | IP Logged 
I actually downloaded that a couple year ago, but never did much with it as I didn't study
Japanese for long before dropping it that time around. From the readme.txt inside the
file (which I still have), it sounds like there is no install process, just extract the archive
and run it. Here is an excerpt from the readme:

Quote:

There's no real installation procedure, this game is ready to run as soon
as you unpack it.

Note: the game won't work properly if you try to run it from within an opened
archive. Drag the whole Slime Forest folder out onto your desktop or other
convenient location.

To play the game in Windows or OS X, run one of:
-Slime Forest (windowed)
-Slime Forest (fullscreen)

In Linux, "runold", "run32", and "run64" try to launch different executables.
Hopefully one will be compatible with your system.
(you may find it useful to edit one these files to point to the right path
and copy it to ~/bin/sfa ).

For gameplay instructions, see: instructions.txt

More information is available at: http://lrnj.com/

3 persons have voted this message useful



solaren
Newbie
United States
Joined 3525 days ago

36 posts - 42 votes
Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish, Japanese

 
 Message 11 of 32
24 March 2015 at 4:54am | IP Logged 
Today, I did my usual schedule:

*45 minutes of passive recognition using Jpod101.
- Today was lesson 5 from Beginner Season 4. Up to this point I've completed the two previous seasons leading up to this one, so about 55 lessons with JPOD101.
- When I left for work I could understand about 95% of the dialog listening and 100% reading along. When I came home, my reading was still 100% but my listening was about 80%. I'll come back to this lesson for review tomorrow and throughout the week.

*30 minutes of Kanji recognition using LRNJ.
- I don't do any kanji over the weekend, so Monday's are always a little bit tougher. Surprisingly though, there are many kanji that just seem to stick really well. This is really a great way to learn kanji, as I still have fun doing it. 30 minutes a day is about all I can take though as I find it mentally draining.
- I also use these 30 minutes working on Kanji to listen to a previous season's dialog of Jpod101.

*15 minutes of Passive review from the current season.
- This meant that I listened to lessons 1-5 in Beginner Season 4 for 15 minutes in passive mode. I use this to check my comprehension and see if there are words that I need to look up again.

*30 minutes of active L1-L2 translation in a previous season.
- This isn't easy but I feel I get great results from it. The hard part is reminding myself to speak out loud. Sometimes I catch myself whispering the words to myself as I think about how to form the sentences.

I also did some shadowing in the car today for about 10 minutes. I have a short commute.
1 person has voted this message useful



solaren
Newbie
United States
Joined 3525 days ago

36 posts - 42 votes
Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish, Japanese

 
 Message 12 of 32
24 March 2015 at 5:20am | IP Logged 
Something I've been thinking a lot about lately is Romaji and whether or not it has a place in studying Japanese. As far as I can tell the biggest problem with Romaji is the following point:

1. When Romaji is paired with Kana it is very distracting to the eye. This mainly has to do with our brain being more comfortable with the roman alphabet. The brain will take any shortcut it can get when it comes to processing information.

But what about when the Romaji, Kana and Kanji transcripts are separate? For someone like myself who can read Kana and a number of Kanji, is Romaji even useful? I actually find it very useful. I'll explain why.

During my morning study session for 45 minutes where my goal is to obtain as much listening comprehension as I can within the given timeframe, I almost avoid Kana / Kanji entirely.

Since my goal is to maximize my listening comprehension for that study session, I start by comparing the Romaji and English transcripts together because I can absorb the information more quickly. Only once I have a strong comprehension of the spoken dialog do I, with whatever time I have left, move onto reading the lesson in Japanese.

I feel comfortable doing this because I have set aside time later in the day for Kanji and Kana study. During my nightly review and active phase, I focus on the Japanese transcript entirely. To be completely honest, I think the least useful of all the transcripts is the Kana only transcript with no Kanji. It isn't reflective of native writing, and if I have to look up a Kanji word that I can't pronounce, the Romaji is still the quicker method.

So yeah, I thought I'd offer that point of view as food for thought. Personally speaking, even though I read Kana and actively study Kanji every day, I still use Romaji regularly to speed up my listening comprehension.

Edited by solaren on 24 March 2015 at 5:28am

1 person has voted this message useful



solaren
Newbie
United States
Joined 3525 days ago

36 posts - 42 votes
Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish, Japanese

 
 Message 13 of 32
25 March 2015 at 8:31am | IP Logged 
Today I did my usual schedule, except I replaced my 15 minute review tonight with some language exchange time:

*45 minutes of passive recognition using Jpod101.
-Today was lesson 6 from Beginner Season 4. I left for work with about 95% listening comprehension, and after a long day at work I think I dropped to about 70% tonight. I'm not surprised given that I haven't had much energy today.

*30 minutes of Kanji recognition using LRNJ.
-I'm up to 160 Kanji learned in the program. It actually uses a rather unconventional method of introducing Kanji. The kanji are introduced in batches of similar looking kanji, which forces you to recognize the subtle differences straight away. I like this because it helps avoid potential confusion down the road and really encourages you to take notice of the subtle similarities between kanji... like 区,凶 and 土,士.

*30 minutes of active L1-L2 translation in a previous season.

*30 minutes of practice with my language partner in Japan over Skype.
-I'm still not at a point where I feel comfortable speaking in Japanese for extended periods. My sentences still come out broken and I have trouble actively recalling words. I haven't been doing my active phase for long though, and I can feel the practice helping so I feel confident that this area will improve steadily over time as I continue my current study routine.



1 person has voted this message useful



solaren
Newbie
United States
Joined 3525 days ago

36 posts - 42 votes
Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish, Japanese

 
 Message 14 of 32
27 March 2015 at 7:32pm | IP Logged 
The last few days I have been doing my normal study routine, minus Kanji study on my
lunch. Unfortunately, the last few days at work were filled with lunch meetings.
Hopefully starting today I'll be back on my normal Kanji lunch routine.

I've noticed lately that it is taking less time for me to get through my listening
comprehension lessons each morning. This week I've been doing two lessons every
morning which is pretty awesome. I think this may be a sign that I'm getting more used
to the structure of the language and as a result I'm absorbing information more
quickly than before.

I find the active phase work of translating from L1-L2 more mentally taxing. It's not
easy to force myself to do it each day, even though I know it's probably the most
important part of my study routine right now.

I'm finding the Assimil method applied to Jpod lessons to be fun and effective
overall. I'm pleased with the progress that I'm making. At some point I'll probably go
back to the actual Assimil lessons and do those too, but I'm interested in seeing just
how far Jpod can take me doing it this way.
1 person has voted this message useful



dampingwire
Bilingual Triglot
Senior Member
United Kingdom
Joined 4653 days ago

1185 posts - 1513 votes 
Speaks: English*, Italian*, French
Studies: Japanese

 
 Message 15 of 32
28 March 2015 at 2:31pm | IP Logged 
solaren wrote:
Something I've been thinking a lot about lately is Romaji and whether or not it has a place in studying Japanese.
As far as I can tell the biggest problem with Romaji is the following point:

1. When Romaji is paired with Kana it is very distracting to the eye. This mainly has to do with our brain being more comfortable
with the roman alphabet. The brain will take any shortcut it can get when it comes to processing information.


My biggest gripe with romaji is that there are so many different forms from which to choose. It's almost as though each textbook
starts off with "We'll be using Modified hepburn, but just in case you think you're going to have a clue, we'll change it
slightly just for fun ...". At least with the kana you *know* how to enter it into an online dictionary unambiguously. Just look
at how many ways you can write romaji. The one I've been using is the most common - and leads you to an incorrect pronunciation!

solaren wrote:
So yeah, I thought I'd offer that point of view as food for thought. Personally speaking, even though I read Kana
and actively study Kanji every day, I still use Romaji regularly to speed up my listening comprehension.


I did find it useful to have the romaji transcript in the very beginning, but now it's more of a distraction than anything else.
Once you can read kana, you don't really have any use for romaji. The fact that you can read a text more quickly in romaji than
you can in kana isn't a good thing: it just means you haven't had anywhere near enough practice at reading kana yet. I was the
same: for a long time I found it easier to use the JPOD101 romaji transcripts. Then I decided to use the kana and accept an
initial hit in reading time. The result was that my kana reading speed began to increase. Now, although I can still use romaji, I
prefer the kana.

The higher-level text books (and most, if not all, native material) don't use romaji. Leaving the that crutch behind is the
easiest step you can take towards proficiency. (Would that it were so simple to internalise all the kanji ...!).

Re-eading what I've written, perhaps it's a little strong. There are lots of ways of learning Japanese and if you are happy, then
carry on. I'm just offering an alternate point of view based on what I've been through. Reading using the kana is harder
initially because of the lack of familiarity, but its a matter of weeks to get past that and perhaps only months to get your
reading speed to the point that it matches reading with romaji.


1 person has voted this message useful



solaren
Newbie
United States
Joined 3525 days ago

36 posts - 42 votes
Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish, Japanese

 
 Message 16 of 32
28 March 2015 at 6:07pm | IP Logged 
I respect your opinion, dampingwire. Romaji is definitely not without controversy and I agree that Romaji is a crutch. Personally speaking though, I think that crutches can be okay if they facilitate a specific goal.

If my study time each day was not segmented into various parts with strict time limits and specific goals, I'd probably ignore Romaji as well. Howeever, as I haven't hit that point yet where reading kana/kanji feels just as natural as the roman alphabet, my reading would slow down listening comprehension work each morning. Listening comprehension is also the skill I value the most above speaking, reading, and writing (in that order.)

At some point though, I'll need to transition fully into native materials. My hope is that what I'm doing now doesn't delay that process, but instead by the time I'm ready for it (after finishing the Jpod101, Assimil, and have the standard 2,000 Kanji shapes memorized) it will be a smooth transition that happened without needing to sacrifice even a little bit of progress in the skill I want to acquire most (listening).

Edited by solaren on 28 March 2015 at 6:08pm



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